One-Night Stands
by meetmeatthecoda
Summary: Re-posting and continuation of Chapter 24 of Facets. Red and Liz have a drunk one-night stand and they manage to successfully navigate the repercussions. Fluffy and cute Lizzington with Saram in chapter 2.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Liz sighs, slamming her car door shut with as much force as she can muster and trudging up the driveway to the front door of Red's latest safe house, wishing with every part of her that a meteor would fall from the sky and just kill her.

Cooper has forced her to drive an hour and a half outside of the city to talk to Red and get the latest on their current case. And Red is probably the last person she wants to talk to right now. Or maybe for the rest of her life.

Why?

Because she and Red had sex last night.

They were both totally drunk, of course, staking out a nightclub for hours and hours into the night in an effort to catch their blacklister and for some reason Liz just kept ordering rounds. At first, she only pretended to drink them (she has some sense of duty, after all) but then it passed midnight and she was technically off the clock and they played her favorite song on the dance floor and suddenly she realized exactly how long it has been since she had a fun night out.

So, she started throwing them back.

Red had raised his eyebrows, surprised (and a little turned on, she figured out later), and had quickly followed suit, downing glass after glass of scotch in a self-proclaimed effort to keep up with her. And then, after her fourth or fifth tequila shot, Liz dragged him onto the dance floor where things proceeded to get interesting.

(Red can dance. Dirty.)

Before too long, they were both danced-out, hammered, and leaning on each other, giggling like crazy. She suspects that the bartender cut them off and ordered them a cab because the next thing she knew she was tucked in a car backseat in the dark, her hand on Red's thigh and Red's hot breath ruffling her hair, speeding towards his safehouse. By the time they stumbled through the door, they were making out and, well…they barely made it to his bedroom.

Liz comes to a stop in front of the door now, exactly where she and Red had struggled with the keys last night, giggling loudly with hands wandering bravely, and squeezes her eyes shut, trying to banish last night's hazy memories. It hadn't been a bad one-night stand, as one-night stands go. In fact, it was one of the best nights Liz has had in a long time. Red was…amazing, actually. And, surprisingly, she finds herself thinking that she wouldn't mind a repeat performance at some point.

That is, should would, except for the fact that this morning, after waking up naked and tangled with Red, her head pillowed on his strong chest, warm and content (albeit with a raging headache and an awful dry mouth), she had panicked. She had leapt out of bed, completely terrified, wasting no time in getting dressed, and left, with Red only waking up as she was grabbing her bag and hurrying out the door. He only had time to prop himself up on his elbows and call her name in a deep morning voice that she had a very hard time ignoring.

They haven't spoken since.

And now, here she is, her headache still pounding lightly behind her eyes, being forced to speak to him long before she is really ready to, all because of stupid work. She huffs, glancing towards the sky and making a last desperate plea for that meteor. This will teach her not to sleep with her coworkers.

With an internal groan, Liz decides to just get it over with already and she knocks on the door with a roll of her eyes. But before she can perhaps change her mind, maybe turn around and make a break for her car, she realizes that the door isn't actually latched. It swings open soundlessly under her fist, granting her entrance into the safehouse with no questions asked.

Oh. All right then.

Liz pushes forward into the house with a shrug, knowing that on any other day, she would have taken pleasure in playfully reprimanding Red for not checking the locks on his doors like a real criminal.

At least, she would have.

If she and Red hadn't had sex last night.

(She really has to stop saying that to herself.)

She walks quietly into the house, wondering which room Red is in. She is just trying to work up the nerve to call out for him when she hears voices coming from what looks like the library down the hall. Thinking that, at this point, she'll do just about anything to delay talking to Red, she creeps forward to listen.

"And she just left?" That's Dembe's voice.

"Yes…" Liz hears Red sigh, sounding defeated. "I was barely awake and she was already out the door. She must regret last night. I didn't…"

"Raymond," Dembe says firmly. "Elizabeth is a grown woman, she is responsible for her choices. You did not take advantage of her."

Liz nods approvingly from out in the hall. She was simply embarrassed this morning, she thought Red had assumed as much. She wasn't drunk enough that she didn't know what was happening last night. She's not some light weight teenager. Red should know that. Silly man.

"I know, Dembe," Red mutters. "But we were both so drunk…" Red sounds regretful. Liz frowns, worry quickly filling her. She hadn't considered that yet. Does Red regret last night?

"Do you regret it, Raymond?" Liz has never been more thankful for Dembe and his keen observational skills.

There is a tense moment of silence, Liz holding her breath out in the hall.

"No," Red says finally. "Elizabeth was…exquisite. I just wish she had stayed this morning so we could talk about it, that's all."

Liz blushes lightly in the hallway but feels very grateful to Red for not sharing any sordid details of their night of passion, the way a more tactless man might. But she feels better now, relaxed. She and Red are clearly on the same page, they just need to talk about last night.

(She should have stayed this morning.)

"I'm sure she will be ready to talk soon, Raymond," Dembe tells him wisely. "Just give her time."

Liz smiles, making a mental note to give Dembe a card or a fruit basket or something in thanks. She's been so silly.

But then she is startled to hear footsteps leaving the library and coming closer and suddenly she is face to face with Dembe himself, who has entered the hallway and is staring at her, thoroughly surprised.

"Elizabeth," he says loudly, probably mostly for Red's benefit. Liz hears a thump from inside the library. Liz can clearly imagine Red running into something as he whirls around in surprise. Even through her panic, she has to stifle a snort. But Dembe seems to be waiting for some sort of explanation. Liz blinks at him.

"Uh, the door was open," she says stupidly.

"I see," Dembe murmurs kindly, no anger in his voice. "Raymond is in there," he says, a little unnecessarily, nodding to the library. He gives her a look, part amused and part exasperated, and moves quietly past her down the hallway.

Liz brings a hand up and pinches the bridge of her nose. She could have handled that better.

"Lizzie?" she hears Red call from inside the library. She sighs. Well, here it goes. With a fortifying breath, she rounds the corner and enters the library to see Red standing next to a desk in the far corner, staring at her inscrutably and gnawing on his cheek.

"How much of that did you hear?" he asks stiffly, after a long moment.

"I'm not sure," murmurs Liz in response. "Enough to know how you feel, I think."

"I see," he says, looking at her cautiously. "And how do you feel? Do you regret it?" The last question seems softer and more tentative than the others. Scared.

Well, that won't do.

"No," says Liz firmly. "Actually, it was…the best night I've had in a while." She smiles a little crookedly at him and his lips twitch.

"Me too," he says, chuckling breathily, sounding distinctly relieved. "But that's to be expected, I suppose."

She hums non-committedly at that, just looking at him affectionately. She'd rather not get into Red's feelings right now, things she knows he has been harboring for a long while. That's for another day.

"So, what do we do now?" he asks, his posture relaxing but his tone still a little hesitant.

She smiles.

"I'm not sure," she says, pretending to think about it. "But I do know that…I still remember the way you taste."

She watches as his eyes darken in what she now recognizes as arousal. The thought fills her with excitement.

"Do you now?" he questions lowly, starting toward her in something that looks deliciously like a prowl. "Because I believe I'm starting to forget."

She grins as he gets closer and she takes a few steps meet him in the middle of the room. They stop in front of each other, barely a breath of air between them. "And I think you'd like to remedy that, wouldn't you, Red?" she draws his nickname out into one teasing syllable, walking her fingers up his chest to lace them around the back of his neck.

"Aren't you presumptuous?" he murmurs, his eyes sparkling, hands coming up to wrap around her waist, thumbs rubbing at her sides.

She raises her eyebrows playfully.

"Tell me I'm wrong," she dares.

He smirks, his eyes darting down to her lips.

"Never."


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Liz stands near Aram's workstation in the bull pen of the Post Office, watching as Red paces back and forth across the large space, telling the team all about their new blacklister. But Liz isn't paying the least bit of attention. Her eyes follow Red as he dominates the room, watching his face as he walks towards her, eyes alight and face animated as he talks, and the line of his broad shoulders as he turns around and strides the other way, his posture confident and assured. And then her eyes drift…lower.

Liz smirks to herself.

After her unintentional eavesdropping and resulting heart-to-heart at his safehouse, she and Red decided to explore their new relationship. But, after jumping so quickly into sexuality before, they decided to take their time and learn about one another before sleeping together again. They went on dates and shared only chaste kisses on doorsteps before parting for the night, taking pleasure in discovering each other little by little, recreating the few tentative first dates they didn't have before sleeping together. They took it slow.

For a little while.

It certainly was enjoyable to languish in the playful tension they felt over dinner and on the phone with one another but that electricity that seems to constantly vibrate in between them didn't take long to implode. Good night kisses became longer and more indulgent before moving inside and quickly morphing into something warmer and altogether harder to stop.

So, they stopped trying.

And now there are no more boundaries in between them. They are officially a full-fledged couple, considering themselves an item, with all the…benefits that provides.

Liz smirks again in the bullpen, remembering the extensiveness of last night's…benefits. Neither of them got much sleep. Red is insatiable. And, in all honestly, so is she. Now they've started down that road, they can't seem to keep their hands off one another. Liz tries to find it in herself to mind but she can't quite manage it.

(She's never been so happy.)

The only thing that doesn't sit too well with Liz about her and Red's current relationship is that they are trying to keep it quiet. Dembe knows, of course, but none of the team at the Post Office. The secrecy is not out of disregard for Liz's colleagues or pure self-interest for her and Red. They just decided that it would be easier for everyone to keep things between themselves for a while.

So, no one in the room with them knows that Liz and Red are sleeping together. And Liz would be lying if she said that knowledge didn't give her something of a thrill.

Red makes another pass in front of her, magnanimously wrapping up his lecture on the dangers of arsonists, which Liz knows she should not be finding nearly as entertaining as she is. But, while he is facing her and his back is turned towards the others, he throws her a wink and the kind of look that she is positive is not appropriate in the workplace.

Good lord.

 _No one knows, no one knows_ , Liz chants to herself. That is the only reason she is not currently pinning Red to the file cabinet next to her and having her way with him. Also, public indecency charges.

(Even though she has a feeling that Red would take as much pride in those as he does in his Most Wanted poster.)

Liz blinks her way out of her pleasant thoughts as the team suddenly scurries into action around her, Red having concluded his briefing. She must have missed that. Whoops. Oh well, Red can catch her up later.

(Maybe.)

As she watches, he wanders over to Aram's workstation and peers over his shoulder at the complicated algorithms he is running to try and locate their blacklister. Red's eyes widen at the flashing figures on Aram's screen and he squints at them in confusion, Liz watching in fond amusement.

The poor man is helpless with technology, completely useless when compared to Aram's skillful fingers flitting over the keyboard, though they do seem a little slower and clumsier than usual. But Liz certainly doesn't mind, Red has different talents, and she remembers all too well the things that his hands can do…

"Liz?"

Liz startles and turns around to see Samar standing next to her, her signature look of amused disapproval present on her pronounced features, which seem paler and more drawn than usual.

"Sorry," Liz mutters, turning away from Red, who is now pointing at things on Aram's screen and pestering him with questions. Annoying, distracting, wonderful, sexy man. "I was completely zoned out. What's up?"

"I was just asking if you were going to drink that coffee," Samar nods to Liz's untouched mug of coffee, perfectly prepared by Red before the briefing and inconspicuously left on the desk next to her, only to be forgotten as he started to pace, drawing her attention away from his sweet gesture, the most overt he can be with his feelings here in the Post Office.

"Oh," says Liz, a little surprised at Samar. She's never been keen on sharing. "No, I guess not. You can have it if you want, I haven't had any of it, I just –"

But Samar doesn't wait for Liz to finish what surely would have been a half-hearted and unconvincing explanation. She simply reaches past Liz and grabs the mug, wasting no time in bringing it to her face and starting to gulp it down.

Liz's eyebrows raise as she watches Samar guzzle the coffee as if she's dying of thirst. Liz only knows of one thing that can make someone that desperate for caffeine. Curious but tentative, Liz purses her lips, resigned to waiting until Samar has finished the contents of her mug before questioning her.

In the meantime, over Samar's shoulder, Liz catches sight of Red again, who has apparently grown bored with Aram's triangulations, and is now blatantly snooping through the contents of his desk. Aram doesn't seem to notice, which Liz thinks is odd, given that he is normally quite protective over all the knick-knacks carefully arranged on his workstation.

But Aram doesn't nervously suggest that maybe perhaps Mr. Reddington has other things to do with his time, as Liz would have expected him to any other day. He just ignores Red and blindly reaches for his own coffee mug, continuing his calculations with one unsteady hand while taking a drink not unlike the one Samar is finishing up.

Hm.

Samar finally drains the contents of Liz's mug and replaces it on the desk, giving a rather pained sigh and wiping her mouth inelegantly.

"Thanks," she sighs, sounding relieved and exhausted at the same time.

"Sure thing," Liz says easily, eyeing her. "You okay?"

Samar's tired eyes flick to her face nervously. "Yes, fine, thank you. Why do you ask?"

Liz rolls her eyes. "Cut the crap, Samar. You look like hell, not to mention you're obviously hung-over."

To Samar's credit, she does try to muster an indignant expression but it doesn't last. She gives up after a moment, sighing in defeat and rubbing a hand over her face.

"What gave me away?" she mutters sarcastically.

Liz smiles a little at her, her gaze wandering to Red again. She sees his face light up as he plucks a rubber band ball from the organized clutter on Aram's desk, holding it up with a triumphant crow.

(Adorable.)

"Well, the coffee chugging, for one thing," Liz says idly, speaking off-hand to Samar but still keeping an affectionate eye on Red. She watches as he hurries a few feet away from Aram's desk, chattering to him all the while and gesturing excitedly, clearly trying to start a well-intentioned but poorly timed game of catch with the rubber band ball.

Liz sees Aram try to protest, shaking his head desperately and making excuses, but Red pays no mind, not waiting any longer to toss the ball in a cheerful underhand pass. Aram manages to catch it unsteadily and gives a half-hearted smile to Red, who nods encouragingly, eagerly telling him to pass it back.

"And the general behavior, of course," Liz continues, turning her gaze back to Samar. "Squinting at bright lights, slow reaction time, the works." She can now just see the rubber band ball being tossed in a gentle arc over Samar's head at even intervals.

"Ah," Samar mutters, clearly unamused with Liz's observations. "I thought maybe I was hiding it."

"Not quite," Liz says kindly, before adding innocently on a whim: "And neither is Aram."

As if to punctuate her statement, there is a loud crash from Aram's workstation as a slightly too enthusiastic overhand pass from Red slips right through Aram's fingers and knocks over his one of his several computer monitors. Liz grimaces sympathetically as Samar and Aram give identical pained looks at the loud noise, Samar bringing an unsteady hand up to her temple and Aram ignoring his headache in favor of panicking over his computers.

Samar gives another long-suffering sigh. "Aram and I had a bit of an…incident last night."

"Oh yes?" Liz inquires curiously, watching Red hurry over to Aram, his hands fluttering uselessly over his fallen equipment, clearly feeling responsible and wanting to help but also afraid to break anything. Her poor, technology-repellent man. Liz suppresses a grin. "What kind of incident?"

"The…drunk, accidental kind," Samar mutters, shifting uneasily on her feet and turning her gaze to the floor. "It's quite awkward really. We didn't mean it to happen, though I wouldn't have been opposed, necessarily, had we been sober. But I'm not sure how Aram feels about it and I'm certainly not going to ask him now."

Liz glances at Aram, sweet, nervous Aram, gently brushing imaginary dust off his rescued monitors as if they were his children. "Oh, I wouldn't worry about Aram. He's crazy about you." Liz smiles at Samar, whose eyebrows raise in surprise and a hint of hope.

"You think so?" she murmurs. Liz nods easily. She's happy to think of her two friends finally getting together. It's been a long time coming for them.

"You don't think the circumstances will sour things? I mean, a drunk one-night stand isn't exactly romantic," Samar murmurs to her, some uncharacteristic hesitation returning to her eyes.

"Oh, no," says Liz firmly. "Don't worry about that. Sometimes something like that has to happen to move things along. I think of it as fate's way of encouraging us." Liz fondly remembers just how encouraging her and Red's drunk hook-up was for their relationship.

"Hmm," mutters Samar, her brow furrowing in thought. "So, you think things can still work out between us?"

"Sure, I do," says Liz confidently. "Just don't wait to confront the elephant in the room. Talk about it as soon as you can, even if you don't want to. It's best to get it out of the way and move on, you know?"

Samar nods slowly, looking at Liz carefully, a bit of her usual suspicion returning to her tired eyes. "It rather sounds as though you have experience with this sort of thing."

Liz's eyes flick unintentionally to Red, who is giving Aram one last heartfelt apology and pat on the back, carefully giving his workstation a clear radius as he wanders away.

(Silly man.)

"You could say that."

Samar's dark eyes follow Liz's gaze to Red, lighting up at the connection. "Oh, I see," she murmurs, a little teasing entering her voice. "Is that so?"

Red collects his jacket and hat from the chair he left them on and glances over at Liz, giving her a subtle, meaningful look before heading to the elevator.

"Liz?"

Liz turns back to a newly curious Samar, who is watching her carefully, a smile now pulling at the corners of her mouth. Liz quickly stands and straightens her blazer.

"Yeah, um, listen, I gotta run. But, seriously, don't wait to talk to Aram, the sooner the better, okay?"

"Wait, you're not going to give me any details? I told you about Aram!" Samar hisses as Liz impatiently edges closer to the elevator. "Oh, come one, at least tell me, is he any good?"

"Oh, please, Samar, I don't kiss and tell," Liz says loftily, turning and walking away from her. She hears Samar sigh quietly behind her in disappointment.

(Although, she and Samar did have a bit of a breakthrough today. Why shouldn't Liz repay her confidence? Perhaps it's time to let her friends in on her and Red's relationship.)

"But yes," Liz tosses over her shoulder, jogging across the bullpen to catch the elevator.

She can hear Samar's delighted laughter as she squeezes in between the doors right before they slam shut, all the noise of the bullpen ceasing in an instant. Suddenly, Liz finds herself trapped inside a small, slow-moving box with Raymond Reddington.

(Perfect.)

They stare at each other for a moment, the world seeming to shrink down to the space between the two of them.

"Well," Liz murmurs, batting her lashes at Red. "Fancy meeting you here."

He plays along right away.

(Of course.)

"Yes, what a coincidence, Agent Keen," he growls, slowly moving closer to her, crowding her against the wall of the elevator. "I haven't seen you since…hmm, when was that? Last night, was it?"

"Yes, I think so," Liz breathes, her eyes fluttering closed as Red presses a gentle kiss to her neck.

"Hmm…" he hums. "If I remember correctly, it was an enjoyable night. I'm a little fuzzy on the details though, what was it we did again? See a movie?"

Liz lets out a breathy laugh, bringing her fingers up to scrape gently over his scalp, making him hum contently, pressing more kisses along the line over her collarbone.

"Something like that," Liz whispers, languishing in his attention for a moment before getting an idea.

Before he can do anything else, she quickly spins them around to press him to the wall instead. Red lets out his breath in a little huff, looking pleasantly surprised to find their positions reversed.

"Why, Agent Keen, I'm shocked," he breathes, eyebrows comically high on his forehead. "Seducing a master criminal in the elevator of a black site, wherever do you find the nerve?"

"Oh, I've got a lot of nerve, Mr. Reddington, just you wait," she whispers to him. His lips pull up in a delicious smirk and she simply can't wait any longer. So, she leans in to nip playfully at his bottom lip before covering his mouth with her own, pressing close as he wraps his arms around her waist and sighs contently into her mouth.

(What a wonderful kind of heaven. She hopes Aram and Samar have a fraction of this compatibility.)

And as they slowly descend, happily making out in a ridiculous yellow elevator, Liz can only think one thing.

 _Thank god for one-night stands._


End file.
